Penn State Arch Admission

Hi. Curious if anyone knows how competitive Penn State is for their 5 year program. Is it generally harder to get into than other majors there? My son is waiting for a decision from his EA application.

The significant difference for the BArch admission at Penn State versus the other majors is that this is one of the few direct admit acceptances. I believe that only nursing, golf course management and I can’t remember what the other one is. Obviously that makes for a somewhat more competitive admission process. However, having applied early should only be beneficial for your son. IIRC, the BArch program only wants 60 -100 admittees per year.

I suppose I should mention that D2 was admitted to the BArch program back in 2010. For what it’s worth, she was also admitted to the Schreyer Honors College. I believe that about 15 (out of 60) of her fellow graduates from the BArch program were also Honors Scholars.

My info is pretty old–my daughter started in PSU’s arch program in 2005. We toured the school with one of the professors who told us they had over 1000 applications, accepted about 125 hoping to get a class of about 90. Her class did start with about 90, but only half continued through all 5 years. I think that’s pretty typical of BARCH programs. It’s very intense, takes up a lot of time and I think many of the applicants didn’t realize how art-focused the program was.

My daughter is artistic and accepted to Penn State architecture program (BArch) which is a professional 5 years architecture degree program. Daughter is really interested in Architecture or design as she is good at Art, and she is accepted by Penn State but want to know more and more before committing to a high out of state tuition. In state UMD college park offers non professional undergraduate Architecture program, applied and waiting for decisions in late January.
Penn state at least cost us $45K year assuming D gets in Honors and get some scholarship. UMD costs only $12K as she will stay home. Does penn state worth it if she gets in UMD?

I would say penn state more prestigious and has the 5yr professional degree. That would be better abd maybe can get a scholarship to offset the price. What did she decide?